


woven from dianthus

by Chromathesia



Series: acoc fics by chrom [5]
Category: A Crown of Candy - Fandom, Dimension 20 (Web Series)
Genre: Childhood Friends, Gen, calroy + donetta mlm/wlw let's-become-the-king-and-queen solidarity, it's never explicitly stated in the fic but calroy is gay and donetta is an ace lesbian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-24
Updated: 2020-09-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:47:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26627761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chromathesia/pseuds/Chromathesia
Summary: Calroy and Donetta are eight and playing in the fields, they're freshly married, they're shaped by decades at court and at war, they're dreaming together of ascending to royalty so that they can uplift the people forgotten by the Castle, and somehow it all crumbles and where there were once two (always two) there now stands only one.or: an alternate universe where Calroy and Donetta are childhood friends
Relationships: Calroy Cruller & Donetta Cruller, implied Calroy Cruller/Amethar Rocks, implied Donetta Cruller/Caramelinda Rocks, implied Donetta Cruller/Sapphria Rocks
Series: acoc fics by chrom [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1782913
Comments: 4
Kudos: 11





	woven from dianthus

**Author's Note:**

> Y'all spiral over twenty years, but what is twenty years in the face of forty?
> 
> This will be gifted to Eli @FLGAYDA on Twitter once they make an ao3 :')

One of Calroy’s earliest memories is weaving together a string of sugarspun daisies into a delicate wreath that he gently places on his best friend’s head.

Their friendship is a strange one, one unexpected. Who would anticipate the young marchioness and a farm boy with dirt under his nails growing as close as they had? The lady Donetta of House Cruller is just a few months younger than him and their social stations hadn’t stopped them from meeting in a field one day, flopped over and watching the clouds go by.

There’s a soft blush on her cheeks as she gingerly pats the crown he has placed on her head. “Does it look good?” she asks, sticking her nose in the air like the stuffy nobles that they had giggled about together.

“Great,” he says, a grin splitting his face from ear to ear. “You look like a princess.”

Donetta’s brow furrows at that and Calroy feels his grin slip away at her sudden seriousness. “Nettie, is something wrong?” he asks.

“I wish I was a princess,” she says with a slight pout, and Calroy may be all of eight years old but he’s already spent more than half of his life around her and he knows that she’s not just making fun of the other spoiled noble children that she gossips about to him. “What if I became queen one day, Cal?”

Calroy’s eyes widen. “Like, queen of Candia? Aren’t there already four princesses?”

Donetta’s pout slips further and Calroy can see her shoulders tremble and he knows he said the wrong thing. “You think I’m being silly,” she says plainly, “but none of the royal family have even looked at Muffinfield in ages. We barely get news from them and I’ve seen all of the work that you and your brothers have had to do just to get by. One day, I’m gonna be queen, and I’m gonna make sure _everyone_ knows that we’re here.”

Calroy reaches out and grabs her hand, squeezes it. “You will, Nettie,” he says, and he means every one of those three words.

* * *

It’s decades later and the upset over Donetta marrying Calroy has finally subsided. When he agreed to take her last name, all of the nobles’ histrionics over the title of Marquis possibly passing to the house of a lowly commoner finally ceased and moved onto preparing for the upcoming nuptials. Their wedding day had been the talk of all of Muffinfield and quite a boring affair for the two of them. They snuck away early amidst snickers of eager lovebirds and retired to their now shared chambers to drink their way through bottles of champagne while discussing everything and nothing and the people that caught their eyes. 

The nobles wondered why Donetta’s father was so willing to marry her off to Calroy, but House Cruller (his House now, Calroy thinks to himself) kept their secrets close and when Donetta told her father of her disinterest in having a husband in more than one way, he had been more than happy to marry her to Calroy, who at least promised to never push his daughter into something she wouldn’t want.

They’re at what’s supposed to be their marriage bed when Donetta goes quiet.

“What’s going on in that brilliant mind of yours, Nettie?” he asks her, finishing his latest flute of champagne (they’ve nearly killed the bottle and are about to start on their third).

“The Rocks family actually came to our wedding,” she said.

He shrugs. “Well, guess they have to, right?” he says. “It would be unsightly if a royal family didn’t come to a wedding of one of their noble houses. It would look like they’re snubbing us, I guess.”

“Well, did you see _who_ came?” she persists.

Calroy pours himself another flute. He does not have the brainpower for this conversation. “The youngest two siblings right? The Rocks twins?”

Donetta flops onto the bed. “I got to talk to Princess Sapphria,” she says, staring at the ceiling. “You were talking to the Lady of House Swirlie and she approached. Said something about how it’s only rotten husbands that leave their new wives to be snatched up by whoever is walking by.”

Calroy sputters at this, the champagne almost spilling onto his hand.

Donetta is wearing a grin now, because she knows the chagrin that he wears. “I told her off, you crumb,” she says, sitting up and holding her empty flute to him to fill. “Told her that her darling brother caught your eye the way you caught his.”

This time Calroy _does_ spill the champagne. “Excuse me?!” he says, cursing and shaking the alcohol off of his hand while staring at her dumbfoundedly.

Donetta snorts. “He had his eyes on your ass whenever you weren’t looking.” She gives him a sly sideways look. “You clean up well, Cal. I’m not surprised Prince Amethar was eyeing you up.”

Calroy is left speechless.

“Anyhow, Princess Sapphria seemed interested in committing to expanding Muffinfield’s influence in the kingdom. She wanted to talk to both of us.” Donetta turns shining eyes to him. “We’re _doing it_ , Cal. We’re making a difference for our people.”

“Of course,” he says, raising his flute to her. “You’ll rule them all one day, you know.”

She chuckles. “Stop that. You’re too kind.”

* * *

The war came and went and Calroy went to war with Amethar and he and Donetta moved to the castle and whatever inroads she had been making in between courting other nobles alongside the genial Princess came to a halt when Sapphria went missing in the Meatlands. Calroy sees the lines draw themselves on his oldest friend’s face and begins to push his plans further; Ceresia is the most open but it comes at the cost of Calroy needing to prove his promise that he was willing to do whatever it took to put Donetta on that throne (and so Rococoa was mourned).

No one gossips openly about his strange dance with now-King Amethar from his place as his right-hand man. Calroy has to admit to himself that it’s quite fun to gently prod at Amethar’s buttons until the man forgets that he isn’t at war anymore and can’t simply push Calroy to his back and demand submission and is reprimanded by his sister’s widow. The twins, the only proof that technically Amethar and Caramelinda are married, run through the halls and call him Uncle Cal and he trains them in secret, a secret shared with Sir Theobald, the knight once assigned to Caramelinda’s wife.

Calroy didn’t realize just how complicated the Rocks family tree was, really.

Donetta thrives in court. She holds Caramelinda’s ear just as much as Calroy holds Amethar’s, and at the end of the day if neither of them are held back by their respective monarch they meet in their quarters and whisper to each other what they furthered. Donetta gets taxes lowered in Muffinfield in exchange for slightly higher tariffs, which is more manageable for their hometown. Calroy keeps Amethar distracted and sows slight discord in his marriage on a whim. It’s almost a game for the two of them.

And then they hear that the Concordant Emperor has fallen ill.

“Don’t you see?” Donetta whispers. “Who else would Gustavo choose to take the throne? King Cabbage is nearly dead himself, Fructera has no claim to the Concordant Throne, Ceresia doesn’t have an imperator, and the Dairy Isles are led by a child. Amethar is the only one, and with him and Caramelinda gone, who else knows the inner workings of Candia best?” Her eyes shine and that glimmer makes his heart ache.

“That makes sense,” he says. “We’ll have to make sure, though. At the Tournament.”

Donetta nods. “Of course.” A smile stretches across her face. “Oh, Cal, we’re so close.”

He embraces her and she squeals in his arms and he feels his heart sink, thinking of the letters left unsent on his desk.

* * *

He’s almost dragging her through the streets amidst her protests when Donetta finally puts her foot down and forces Calroy to stop.

“Cal, what’s going on?!” she says, out of breath. “Why have we been running to the city border?”

He takes her hands and holds them to his chest. “Nettie, we have to get out of here; the royal family has been compromised and we need to get back to Candia.” Once again, Calroy cursed that the Pontifex and Ciabatta had wanted Amethar gone during the Tournament and that they had been so heavily waylaid by Stilton’s men while on the road. Just one extra day and he would have been able to get in contact with the Vegetanians and told them that Donetta wouldn’t interfere with their plans, but now apparently Liam had been caught weaving magic in the middle of Comida and the other Candians were being looked at with suspicion and the people who were supposed to be his allies were far more trigger-happy, even with those that he had assured weren’t dangerous.

She looks so confused but he can see the beginning of heartbreak in her gaze and he wonders how she figured it out so quickly. He shouldn’t have wondered; she’d always been quick-minded.

“Calroy, what have you done?” she whispers. “If the royal family is in danger, we should go and find Amethar and the girls–”

“They’re with Sir Theobald, they’ll be fine” ( _but we won’t be_ , he leaves out for now) “we should focus on getting out of the capital so we can meet up with them at the castle.”

“And Finnegan? Why have we left him and Nilla behind?”

Behind a blink, Calroy sees a flash of the nobles they had known and been friends with, slumped over with crimson pulsing out of them (not by his hand) (but as good as) (probably). Calroy tries to say something but just as he’s known Donetta for four decades she has known him and she catches the way his eyes flutter and narrows in on him.

“Calroy, what have you done?” she repeats.

“It’s too late for them and if we’re not fast enough it’ll be too late for–” (not for him). Calroy takes a shaky breath, gripping harder on Donetta’s hands. She grips back desperately. “We need to get out of here. I have people I can contact so that neither of us are in danger, but there isn’t any time, we have to get out of the city.”

He can tell that Donetta wants to argue, to persist on hearing the full truth from him in the middle of the street.

“Nettie, don’t you trust me?” he pleads.

She stares at him and there is grief and a slowly dawning horror and a steeliness in her expression that he’s never seen there before.

“I do, Cal,” she finally says. “Let’s get to Candia.”

But it isn’t soon enough and when they get to the border of the city, Calroy is met by Sir Keradin holding a mace dotted with chocolate that Calroy thinks he recognizes. His gorge rises and he doesn’t realize that his grip on Donetta’s hand has tightened until another Vegetanian knight forces them apart. Before Calroy can do anything, Keradin grabs his shoulder and holds his wrists behind his back.

“Get off of me! Get off of me!” He strains towards Donetta, who is fighting to get back to him even while the asparagus man behind her grimaces and holds her still. “Nettie, don’t worry! Don’t panic! We’ll get out of this! Let go of me, you cretin!” He growls that last bit at Keradin, whose eyes seem vacant, even when he blinks at Calroy in response.

“Lord Cruller, you must remain calm,” Keradin says quietly, even as Calroy continues to struggle. “You will be returning to Castle Candy to continue your work within the royal court. We will ensure that the Lady Cruller won’t get in your way as you carry on.”

For the first time, Calroy doesn’t know how to talk his way out of this situation, and he watches the other knight pull Donetta away down the street, still fighting to get back to him. His throat is so dry, his heart pounding loud enough in his ears to almost drown out Keradin’s logical, cold, damning voice. He watches her go, and she watches him stand there, and they both look ready to cry but their expressions share a harshness that even war had failed to instill in them.

And with that, Calroy and Donetta became just Calroy.

* * *

There’s a wind in the air when Calroy stands behind Amethar, his old friend’s head framed by the clouds in the sky.

“You know what I’ve always hated about you, Amethar?” 

_He can see Donetta looking at him, smiling. Her words echo in his ears: “Look, Cal, isn’t the sunset beautiful?”_ Amethar’s blood runs over his hands. 

“You were so damned lucky. I mean”– _his wedding night, Donetta with a flute of champagne, giggling over the attention a beautiful princess had given her_ –”fifth in line for the throne and the crown rests on your head.”

_A wreath of flowers: beautiful, tender dianthuses woven together._

“And each of your sisters, better and more clever than you. It really makes the unfortunate minor lord of a less than wealthy barony feel a little underwhelming.” 

_Donetta poring over a scroll of numbers, desperately tracking Muffinfield’s exports and trying to find some loophole that allowed her to circumvent some of the taxes that their people would be crippled by._

“I’ll say, your sisters were a little bit less lucky. The least lucky thing that ever happened to Rococoa was when she found out that I was selling weapons to the Ceresians. That had to be dealt with and I think you'll remember how strange it was that she was found riddled with arrows so far behind our own lines, but that's war and strange things happen all the time. Ceresians, I find, are very reasonable. Very reasonable. And you can see some of their tents out here in the field.”

_Kind Ceresian farmers bringing their excess crops to his father so that his family can eat: the shame of relying on others tempered by the warmth of a full stomach._

“You know, I don’t have luck, so I have to work.” He twists the dagger, even as he feels the metal dissolve. “I have to work a lot. I used to have a partner through it all. Do you remember my dear wife Donetta? I’m sure Caramelinda does. Shame, isn’t it, that when it was your family being persecuted, it was all of us that had to suffer for it? House Swirlie fallen, House Cruller close behind. 

“Did you know that Donetta that helped your dear wife Caramelinda write every piece of legislation that has come out since the war ended?” _Donetta collapsed on their bed, Calroy sitting at his desk, debating the intricacies of a treaty that Caramelinda was crafting with the Dairy Isles while Amethar took the twin princesses out to Dulcington._

“One would think that the King would have weighed in on such things. Imagine, having a competent person as a partner.” 

Calroy lets the empty hilt fall. _It shatters like glass, like the champagne flute from his wedding night that he threw at Donetta for making one too many jokes about then-Prince Amethar at his expense._ “I don’t have to imagine, of course, it was my life for many long, wonderful years. And then? I find out that my best friend, my oldest war buddy, has a past. A woman in the Dairy Isles that only his own Dairy Islander friends seem to know about, even though I thought I heard every single one of the Great Prince of Candia’s exploits, even though I knew I _was_ one of the Great Prince of Candia’s exploits. And it takes a little wheedling, a little twisting, but I finally find out about this woman from our mutual friend, Manta Ray. Do you know why I cared so deeply about her, Amethar?” He hears Amethar’s breath start to wheeze and forces him to turn around, to look him in the eyes and see the unbridled hatred and disgust that roils in his gut.

_A wreath of dianthuses, once worn by a girl who dreamed of royal thrones, crushed under the weight of a boot, crushed into the ground._

“She got my true best friend, the person who was practically my sister, killed,” he says coldly. “All for the sake of a prince’s fucking libido. You fuck off and get married to some goddamn bimbo that you forget about for two fucking decades and now my wife is dead.”

Amethar is tipping backwards now and Calroy is not stopping it. “Will they call you Amethar, the Unfallen, after this?” he muses out loud. “Will they call you the Protector of the Realm? You’re doing a piss-poor job of the latter. I have equal hope for the former.” 

And he pushes Amethar off of the castle wall, memories of Donetta’s sly grin still echoing inside of him.

* * *

The days pass slower than any of the years with Donetta by Calroy’s side. He had shared so many intricacies of his life with her and returning to his rooms to see her collection of shoes still neatly lined up by the door never gets any less devastating. 

The sounds of war get closer and closer to his doorstep but Calroy had already handed off the reins of Candia to Ciabatta, who actually seemed to give a damn about the throne that Calroy could not fill by himself. He walks along the walls now, following the same paths that Donetta had loved so much.

Calroy somehow doesn’t notice that the war has come to collect him until he gets to the castle wall. He stares out at the armies that march towards him, towards the soldiers placed in the field. He hears individual shouts that he recognizes, he sees a small red form slip through the entrance to send Ciabatta sprawling to the floor (children learn of war so young nowadays), and–

Two forms: one the wisp of a thought, blue skinned and baleful eyed, staring at him, flanking one that he’s known intimately for twenty years. Calroy lets his eyes dart over Amethar’s form: the lack of crown, the green locs that spill out from where they were once tied off to sit beneath it; the scars of his bubbling skin; the heat in his gaze that Calroy’s sure that he once wore, back when not having Donetta hurt like a steel rod stabbed through his very being. 

He had loved Amethar, once. Of course he had. It felt as though in many iterations of this life, he would have. There are many universal truths, and the one that guides him seems to be that Calroy Cruller will fall in love with Amethar Rocks, and let himself be conquered and watch as he is thrown aside for a future that he cannot be a part of.

In this life, there was another universal truth, and that was that as long as Calroy Cruller had lived, so had Donetta Cruller. They had loved each other too, in that way that two souls meet and bond immediately, in that easy way that had led to them coming back together every night to dream and plan and plot until that fateful day when all of Calroy’s plotting had caught up to him.

Amethar is demanding something of him now. 

Calroy lets it ring in the echoes of his thoughts: _what is the last part of my title?_

“I–”

Amethar cuts him off. Repeats himself. _What is the last part of my title?_

There are three forms in front of him. Amethar, Payment Day raised, cutting a silhouette into the sky. The shifting blue form, who crackles with energy that makes Calroy’s skin crawl. And one more, even more of a ghost, looking at him mournfully. When she catches him looking at her, she gives him a poor attempt at a smile. 

_“Look at yourself,_ ” he hears as a whisper on the breeze, and suddenly all of his fine clothes feel dampened, weighed down by the blood that soaks him now, the deaths that have been piling around him ever since he had decided that Donetta would be his queen one day.

“Ne–”

_What is the last part of my title?_

Calroy looks back to Amethar and he sees that form of Donetta step closer as the blue figure darts over to him and forces him to kneel before Amethar.

“Amethar,” he says hoarsely, and it is the first time he has spoken in days and he can hear the roughness, “the Unfallen.” And he leaps towards Amethar, towards Donetta, towards _something_.

When the sword cuts through his body, he does not feel it, and he is still reaching towards something ineffable.

His hand grips around a soft wreath of woven daisies, and he feels the delicate flowers smash under his grasp.

**Author's Note:**

> daisies for innocence and new beginnings, dianthuses for passion and divinity.
> 
> It's very funny that I've written this many Calroy-centric fics even though he's not my favorite character. I just like writing fics for friends tbh. You can find me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/chromathesia) and [Tumblr](https://chromathesia.tumblr.com).


End file.
